Critical Review of Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature


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(Would be hell to copy the article here with all the formatting correct. Please read at link and feel free to and quote/reply here.)

 

 

 

Critical Review of Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature

Critical Review of Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature

curi.us/1578-critical-review-of-ayn-rand-contra-human-nature

I read the book Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature (ARCHN) by Greg Nyquist (GN). ARCHN is also a blog.

Previously I commented on the book's introduction. You can read that here.

Overall, it is a bad book. Some parts are mixed. Some are even pretty decent. But the book has to be evaluated negatively. It has too much hostility, too many insults. It doesn't just have innocent errors. It has errors due to malice and evasion. It is not objective.

GN and his ARCHN blog friends pretend to be fairly objective, and interested in discussion. They claim they respect Rand and consider her worth studying and criticizing. They say they criticize because she's good enough to pay attention to.

They are lying. They attack Rand because they find her ideas offensive. They don't like her or Objectivism.

Let me relate briefly my experience talking with them on their blog. They say they are interested in discussing with Objectivists. But when you advocate an Objectivist position they act surprised, confused and offended. They start saying that "of course" Objectivism is false, and you can't actually or reasonably believe what you're saying. What they want is to talk to non-Objectivists pretending to be Objectivists (like Kelleyites). Those false friends of Objectivism would agree with them that Objectivism is wrong and validate them.

Rather than being interested in learning what Objectivist positions actually are (e.g. that David Kelley is not an Objectivist), their interest is in denying that the real Objectivism exists at all.

I am making strong claims. I know it. I'm serious; I mean it. Details follow.

ARCHN's Reasoning

ARCHN's reasoning for its non-insult criticisms of Objectivism is repetitive. There are several repeated approaches:

· Objectivism contradicts ARCHN's premises

· "Evidence" or "facts" contradict Objectivism

· Specious scientific authority contradicts Objectivism on non-scientific issues (scientism)

· Objectivism fails to provide "evidence" or "facts" for its positions (often historical evidence)

· ARCHN quotes a supposed authority who contradicts Objectivism (this is usually ARCHN's idea of providing evidence for its side)

· ARCHN asserts that only Objectivists are dumb enough to think something, no one else

· ARCHN asserts that an Objectivist position is obviously false

· GN does not understand some Objectivist position and treats the gap in his knowledge as a flaw in Objectivism

· ARCHN is opposed to philosophy itself, which causes frequent disagreements

ARCHN rarely even attempts to point out internal contradictions within Objectivism or make any arguments that would persuade any Objectivist. Rather, ARCHN starts with premises that Objectivism has refuted and then uses them to reach the conclusion that Objectivism is mistaken.

ARCHN makes a big deal out of "evidence" which usually really means "authority". ARCHN is better at appealing to authority than providing arguments. Sometimes it does try to make arguments, but not often enough. Instead it's always demanding "evidence" rather than thinking through arguments. GN seems unaware of the Popperian (and Objectivist too) point that all evidence has to be interpreted by thought and our philosophy matters to how we do that (there's no escaping philosophy and ideas and thinking).

One thing ARCHN doesn't do is improve on any Objectivist idea. It doesn't even try to. An honest critic would sometimes find what he regarded as a small problem and try to fix it. Sometimes he would come up with some solution he considered successful. Then he could explain the issue and how he thinks it can be resolved without any harm to Objectivism. But GN never does that.

Why doesn't ARCHN do better? Maybe because it's dishonest and hostile. We'll take a look at that first and then return to some of the other issues.

Hostility

ARCHN has way too much hostility and insults. The only positive thing I can say about it is that at least GN doesn't try too hard to hide that he's a rotten bastard. Here is the last paragraph of the book, condensed:

... I would give Objectivism very low marks ... based on years of hard work and study. Those who believe I am being unfair to Rand can go out and do the hard work for themselves. Let them read the philosophers Rand so cavalierly denounces ... familiarize themselves with the best that has been said and thought in the disciplines of political science, sociology, and psychology. If they are intelligent enough to profit from their labors, they will see that, whatever errors I might have committed in regards to this detail or that, in the main, I am justified in my low assessment of Rands philosophical achievement. No one who is well educated in these matters and is endowed with the ability to think critically can ever regard Objectivism as anything other than a mistake.

This is closed minded and infallibilist. It's an appeal to authority, the authority of being educated. No one who is educated could disagree with GN or like Objectivism.

[Atlas Shrugged] is, in fact, neither great nor important. It is, to be entirely frank, a rather ridiculous and overblown philosophical fantasy populated by stock figures whose resemblance to anything human is merely coincidental. The book ... essentially juvenilean exercise in unintelligent, excessively romanticized hero-worship. Such, in any case, would likely be the estimate of any great mind.

No, GN does not value Objectivism. No he does not really think it's good enough to be worth studying and paying attention to. He just hates it and wants to harm it.

Note, again, the appeal to authority and attempt at intimidation. Supposedly any "great mind" would likely agree with GN. Or put another way, if you don't agree with GN, he's saying you must not be a great mind.

It would have been best for Rand if she had simply owned up to the fact that her ideal man was a mere phantom of her overly romantic sensibility and to seek to base her philosophy on something for less impalpable. But she was too proud, too self-willed, too implacable to do any such thing. She stuck to her guns to the bitter end, insisting with increasing vehemence that only she was right and that all the great geniuses of intellectual history who had arrived at very different conclusions regarding the nature of man were either complete ignoramuses or vicious, evil man-haters. Rands idolatry of her ideal” man set her against nearly every important thinker and scholar, past and present, of Western Civilization.

This is not a critic who hopes to be helpful with his criticism. It is attack and denunciation. And appeal to authority. Rand contradicted many "geniuses", therefore she must be wrong. If that's what you think, you do not respect Rand or Objectivism.

ARCHN also has simple insults.

It should be clear to anyone whose mind is not clouded by a steamy fog of erotic sentiment that Rands description of human sexuality contains about as much scientific value as the screeching of a cat in heat.

It is precisely this ethical taint in the Objectivist politics that prevents Rand and her followers from being able to distinguish between political facts and their own wishful thinking.

Paretos truculent realism provides a refreshing contrast to the usual political twaddle presented by soft-headed idealists like Rand and her followers.

It is the practical inexperience of intellectuals like Rand and her followers which, when combined with their intransigent hubris, encourages them to believe that their abstruse chatter can exercise a tangible effect on the course of history. A man of experience would never accept such nonsense.

... Rand and her followers have rendered themselves utterly useless to the cause of freedom.

Rand and her followers are egregious abusers of this fallacious mode of describing historical facts.

If this seems like a cheap verbal trick, well, that is precisely what it is.

The trouble is that [Objectivism's] notion of contextual certainty is entirely worthless.

As usual with rationalizations of this sort, the arguments advanced to defend it were inept and confused.

I do believe [Chris Sciabarra's] suggestion that Hegel and Rand shared the same basic method of thought comes pretty close to hitting the nail on the head.

At bottom, [Objectivism's axioms] are merely pretentious reformulations of several irrelevant truisms.

[Ayn Rand] suffered from the delusion that political problems could be solved by manipulating conceptual constructions.

In [Ayn Rand's] eagerness to prescribe how man ought to be, she blinds herself to what he really is.

OK you get the idea.

Study

It takes a lot of study to understand Objectivism very well. GN did not do an adequate job.

World of Warcraft takes the typical person over 10,000 hours to get good at. When people seem to get good faster, it's because they already had pre-existing relevant skill (e.g. from playing other games). Some people never get good at it.

Chess is a harder game than World of Warcraft. It takes more work to get good, and many more people never get good at it, even after decades.

Objectivism is a lot harder than chess. GN never acknowledges or discusses this. He never considers that maybe sometimes the problem is he didn't study Objectivism well enough. He doesn't explain what he did and didn't do to study Objectivism. He doesn't outline all the great lengths and efforts he went to to learn Objectivism. Did he try very hard at all? Did he try using rational methods? We don't know. (But we can perhaps guess in the negative, judging by the book's content.)

Evidence and History

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, religious belief actually intensified, especially in England and America.

This is an interpretation of history presented as a fact. Usually there would be some authority being quoted and a cite to where the authority asserted it. In this case even that is missing. But the important thing is that ARCHN frequently interprets history according to its own philosophy and premises, then treats its conclusions as historical facts and evidence.

History consists of one long and uninterrupted testimony to this fact. Everywhere in history we find individuals governed either by sentiments (e.g. sentiments of religion, nationalism, humanitarianism, etc.) or by desires (e.g., economic interests, political ambition, vanity, sex drives, etc.).

This is assertion that historical facts prove ARCHN right. It does not acknowledge that he has used his philosophical ideas to interpret history. These are interpretations of history, not plain facts.

No investor will give money to some fledgling entrepreneur just starting out.

Venture capitalists do exactly that today. GN's pessimistic view of life was refuted by practical facts before his book was published (2001). It's easier for new entrepreneurs without reputations to raise money today than in 2001, but it was already possible and happened b

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I'm trying to mess with this to see if the HTML function will work with the page source of the original article.

EDIT: The above insert is the best I can do without putting a lot of time into it. I tried to import the raw html, but it didn't work well. So I ran the thing through some hoops.

Here's what I did:

1. I went to the URL of the article and copied it.

2. I went to a nifty little program called Print Friendly and pasted the URL into it and clicked "print preview."

3. I selected the entire article and pasted it into a Word alternative called Kingsoft Writer (btw - it's free along with the rest of the Office, Google it for the link).

4. I saved the result as an HTML file.

5. I opened the HTML file in my Chrome browser.

6. I right clicked on the page and clicked on "View Page Source."

7. I selected the entire mishmash (including the CSS-like stuff) and copied it.

8. I pasted it into the opening post. but was careful to check the box "Enable HTML" before I did that. Then I published the change.

9. It worked, kind of.

Note to Elliot (Curi): Please let me know if that's OK. If not, I'll remove it. And welcome to OL.

Michael

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Elliot,

I probably should mention that I, and many others on this site, are what you would call "false friends of Objectivism."

Hell, I consider myself to be worse than that if fundamentalist Objectivism is the issue.

So don't expect too much sympathy around here for your views if fundamentalism is your default position.

(btw - I do agree that Nyquist and Daniel are hostile to Ayn Rand and Objectivism, even when they say they are not. And I agree that some of their arguments do not represent Objectivist ideas correctly--and it seems like they do this on purpose.)

Michael

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If you know some good Objectivist discussion forums/lists/etc that are active and pure, I'll be happy for the reference.

I haven't found much and figured I'd give a variety of places a chance and see if they had anything interesting to say. Actually I think the lack of quality online discussion is a flaw with the current Objectivist community.

Anyway, if anyone here is interested in discussing some of my points -- whether they are an Objectivist or not -- I'd give it a try.

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http://www.solopassion.com/credo

"It also seeks to transform the culture of Objectivism itself, from one of cultism, censorship, heresy-hunts, emotional repression and robotic "Randroidism" to one where authentic individuality may blossom."

"SOLO is for those who—to invoke George Walsh's famous remark when he helped David Kelley launch the Institute for Objectivist Studies—consider themselves "homeless Objectivists" still. It’s for those who, after 15 years of IOS/TOC, want an alternative to repressive religiosity within Objectivism other than the timid, tepid somnambulist ecumenism that pervades TOC (now renamed The Atlas Society). It's here for any Objectivist, aligned or non-aligned, who agrees with this Credo. And for any Objectivist who doesn't!"

I am skeptical.

Actually, it looks like solopassion just banned me for posting my review link there. No joke. And no notification sent to me or reason given.

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Elliot,

I will give it a shot a little later.

Just so you know some of the basics of my approach, OL is not a site to preach Objectivism. It is a site where many people who have been influenced by Objectivism to differing degrees come. They use it as a starting point to develop their own thinking. Objectivism is the common ground, so to speak, and honest independent thinking is the the goal, even when it leads in different directions.

In my experience, working through ideas, especially if you want to keep the creative spirit alive, is a messy process, not a neat and tidy one where everyone constantly speaks in the same jargon, bashes the same people, holds the same opinions, bows to the same peer pressure, etc.

I start from the default premise that I trust each individual to direct his or her own mind in a good way. I don't think people are raw defective clay that need to be formed into something of value by a charismatic person or set of ideas. In other words, Objectivism for me is a tool among other tools for good independent-thinking people to live well, not a format for imposing a certain lifestyle and way of thinking on followers.

One of the parts where I believe we will agree will be on getting what Rand said right. Unless a person has not done the reading, I'm a bit of a stickler on that. (I usually encourage those who haven't read Rand's works to read them first before making claims.) I tell critical people bash her if you must, but bash the correct thing, not a misrepresentation.

On the issue of calling oneself an Objectivist, if you open any dictionary, you will always find words have more than one meaning. When I use this term, I don't mean a follower of Ayn Rand out to save the world from an orgy of irrational this or that. I mean it in the sense that someone would call themselves a Kantian. That is, someone who has studied a great deal of this work, likes it for the most part and finds it interesting, and can explain it pretty clearly, or at least can discuss it intelligently.

If you look at the posting guidelines, you will find this is a Branden-friendly site. There are reasons and if you are interested, I will explain them.

I'm not saying any of this to be aggressive. I'm just letting you know where you are at here on OL. Generally, the fundamentalist people do not resonate with my approach, so they stay away. However, if this is your orientation and honest thinking, you are more than welcome to stick around and discuss it with folks.

You will find many wonderful intelligent people here on OL, most of whom like Ayn Rand and Objectivism. And those who don't still find her important enough to discuss why they believe that without all the agenda crap (for the most part :smile: ).

I believe a good idea has to stand up to intelligent scrutiny and challenge to be valid. And that goes for Rand's ideas, too.

I truly hope you resonate with this environment. And if you should not, I still wish you well.

Michael

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Elliot,

I will give it a shot a little later.

Just so you know some of the basics of my approach, OL is not a site to preach Objectivism. It is a site where many people who have been influenced by Objectivism to differing degrees come. They use it as a starting point to develop their own thinking. Objectivism is the common ground, so to speak, and honest independent thinking is the the goal, even when it leads in different directions.

In my experience, working through ideas, especially if you want to keep the creative spirit alive, is a messy process, not a neat and tidy one where everyone constantly speaks in the same jargon, bashes the same people, holds the same opinions, bows to the same peer pressure, etc.

I start from the default premise that I trust each individual to direct his or her own mind in a good way. I don't think people are raw defective clay that need to be formed into something of value by a charismatic person or set of ideas. In other words, Objectivism for me is a tool among other tools for good independent-thinking people to live well, not a format for imposing a certain lifestyle and way of thinking on followers.

One of the parts where I believe we will agree will be on getting what Rand said right. Unless a person has not done the reading, I'm a bit of a stickler on that. (I usually encourage those who haven't read Rand's works to read them first before making claims.) I tell critical people bash her if you must, but bash the correct thing, not a misrepresentation.

On the issue of calling oneself an Objectivist, if you open any dictionary, you will always find words have more than one meaning. When I use this term, I don't mean a follower of Ayn Rand out to save the world from an orgy of irrational this or that. I mean it in the sense that someone would call themselves a Kantian. That is, someone who has studied a great deal of this work, likes it for the most part and finds it interesting, and can explain it pretty clearly, or at least can discuss it intelligently.

If you look at the posting guidelines, you will find this is a Branden-friendly site. There are reasons and if you are interested, I will explain them.

I'm not saying any of this to be aggressive. I'm just letting you know where you are at here on OL. Generally, the fundamentalist people do not resonate with my approach, so they stay away. However, if this is your orientation and honest thinking, you are more than welcome to stick around and discuss it with folks.

You will find many wonderful intelligent people here on OL, most of whom like Ayn Rand and Objectivism. And those who don't still find her important enough to discuss why they believe that without all the agenda crap (for the most part :smile: ).

I believe a good idea has to stand up to intelligent scrutiny and challenge to be valid. And that goes for Rand's ideas, too.

I truly hope you resonate with this environment. And if you should not, I still wish you well.

Michael

Hear, hear!

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Actually, it looks like solopassion just banned me for posting my review link there. No joke. And no notification sent to me or reason given.

I don't know why they would do that. The powers that be there sure aren't fans of ARCHN, Nyquist, Barnes.

Maybe you did something which produced a fatal flaw with the software, or you forgot to sign in when you tried to post, or some other glitch problem.

Ellen

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Yes, they would not post your article (which they would like) and then ban the author! It must be a tech thing.

ARCHN did not ban you even though you called them "rotten bastards" - they said they were going to put the quote on the masthead!

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yet i'm banned from solo and they aren't answering my email inquiring about it.

i logged in fine. i posted fine. i refreshed the page fine. a while later i refresh and find i'm logged out and banned ("blocked"). while logged out, other people's user info page can be viewed but not mine, it's gone. it wasn't some glitch when i went to post or change settings or anything like that. it happened when i wasn't doing anything on the website but checking for a reply. i really think i'm banned.

judging by their credo which i quoted above, i don't think they would like me so much, so i'm not super shocked. ARCHN on the other hand has a rational open-minded self-image which they are protecting by lying about their openness and interest towards discussion. to protect their self-image (primarily in their own minds), they have to end discussions by methods other than banning. shrug.

btw, i fear they like the "rotten bastard" quote because it could be read, out of context, to imply that they have no flaws other than their surface flaws. that is not my view. oh well.

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Curi, I still think it is possible that they just do not have enough people to work the software. Maybe there is a validating period or something. They like what you say, I am sure.

Unless you have a history with Lindsay Perigo or one of his friends there?

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Sorry to hear about the ban.

SLOP is many things worth criticizing, but banning a new user outright for ideas is not their habit. They normally like to toy with the person first, or lead him on in some manner, then lower the boom in a manner gauged for maximum public effect.

If they started a new policy, this implies some kind of fundamental change in their sense of life. :)

Michael

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Hi Curi,

I just wanted to add my welcome to OL.

I have to admit I didn't read your entire article. I believe what you said about ARCHN and it is good to have people like yourself out there criticizing some of the unwarranted attacks on Ayn Rand and Objectivism. However, after a couple pages, I got the point. The author doesn't really like AR or O'ism and you provided numerous quotes in which Nyquist clearly engages in intimidation -- "no intelligent person could possibly agree", etc, and, I'm not very interested in a book that is written that way. I have a hard enough time tolerating it in discussion --- when people are in a hurry or might be losing their temper --- much less in a book which should be a sober discussion of ideas.

Anyway, welcome to OL and I hope to see more interesting posts in the future.

Darrell

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I posted an inquiry on the thread:

http://www.solopassion.com/node/9715#comment-121187

~~~~

Subject: Is "Curi" banned?

yet i'm banned from solo and they aren't answering my email inquiring about it.

i logged in fine. i posted fine. i refreshed the page fine. a while later i refresh and find i'm logged out and banned ("blocked"). while logged out, other people's user info page can be viewed but not mine, it's gone. it wasn't some glitch when i went to post or change settings or anything like that. it happened when i wasn't doing anything on the website but checking for a reply. i really think i'm banned.

~~~~

Ellen

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Have you tried Rebirth of Reason?

As for your review, I actually read the entire thing and quite enjoyed it. It covers so much territory it's difficult to pick any one thing to discuss. I'll take a shot, however. I don't have a huge presence in the online Objectivist world, but people who do "recognize" me around here know that, as a single mother, what I find most lacking in Objectivism is attention to practical parenting. It's only natural, then, that I would pick up on the part of your review that discusses the measure of motherhood. Granted, your review only briefly touches on this and I suspect the quote you reference is taken out of context.

But therein lies the rub, doesn't it? Objectivism, in total, only briefly touches on this topic, and Ayn Rand herself rarely addressed the topic of motherhood. Or parenthood, for that matter.

The bit you quoted:

The characteristic which defines the state of motherhood is that of having given birth. There are no measurements involved in this characteristic. Either a woman has given birth or she hasn’t.

The implication here is that there is no means by which someone can exhibit the characteristics of a mother without having given birth. Yes, having given birth is empirically measurable, but when it comes to being a mother, the act of childbirth is a relatively insignificant event. It's barely a drop in the bucket to the many years of nurturing, caring, disciplining, guiding, counseling, refereeing, feedling, clothing, bathing, etc etc etc that come with being a mother. In fact, childbirth isn't a requirement at all. A woman could, and many do, give birth many times yet never mother a child for a day of her life. A woman could, and many do, mother a child lovingly and excellently for years and years, yet never be pregnant, much less give birth.

Again, the quote is out of context, so I don't know what point the author was trying to make. I can accept, however, that the author was trying to say that Ayn Rand did not fairly characterize motherhood, and I whole-heartedly agree.

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I agree with you that whether you've had a kid is a bad definition of motherhood. He's missed the point of what motherhood means. When he brought it up, I actually expected him to say motherhood was not quantifiable, so measurement omission won't work with it. But then he defined it so it's easily measurable, leaving out any spiritual or psychological aspects, and then he said you can't measure it. So I criticized that lol.

He wasn't trying to say anything about Ayn Rand's view of motherhood. He was just giving his own materialist view of it and using it, as a random example, to make a bad criticism of measurement omission.

I agree with you that Objectivism doesn't say a lot about parenting. I like what it does say. I think there's a few good comments here and there.

Have you heard of Taking Children Seriously? It is a rational parenting philosophy which I think is the best.

http://www.takingchildrenseriously.com/

Its most distinctive feature is the idea that it is both possible and desirable to bring up children entirely without doing things to them against their will, or making them do things against their will, and that they are entitled to the same rights, respect and control over their lives as adults.

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curi:

"David Kelley is not an Objectivist"?

"Those false friends of Objectivism (like Kelleyites)..."?

The little I've viewed of ARCHN left me in no doubt that there is much that's disingenuous contained there, and not much approval of O'ism. A bit of a hit job, basically, which you seem to have tackled quite well.

But to put Kelley in the same boat as Nyquist and others, is an injustice, and frankly, nonsensical.

Rand might well have been describing the goings-on within Objectivism with her important passage (which I've often tirelessly/tiresomely quoted on OL) in ITOE, relating to the historical, philosophical movements of mankind:
i.e. The 'mystical-intrinsicism vs. skepticism' false dichotomy.

Beware the intrinsicist!
He is a disappointed skeptic in the making.

Each of them is one side of the "same counterfeit coin".[AR]
One, the starry-eyed believer - the other, a soured and cynical secularist.

After all, it's a simple coin-flip from: all knowledge and morality is instantly available, to knowledge is impossible (for each individual).

Maybe most of us started out that intrinsic way - buoyed by AR's vision (especially in her fiction) expecting instant, Revelatory knowledge from Objectivism, confering Perfection on us.

The ARCHN fellows strike me as through and through skeptics, disillusioned to discover that learning O'ism is just a start - that that's where the real effortful thinking and action only begins.

The phrase "False friends of Objectivism" (usually apropos the Brandens and David Kelley) has always made me nauseous. It implies intrinsicism. (As well as an injustice to thinkers who comprehend the philosophy better than nearly all of us - and have lived by its principles). Objectivism isn't a nation, a religion, a Cause or an Institute - which can be 'betrayed'. May it long prosper as the body of knowledge and methodology that it is, but it belongs to each individual to make his own, and belongs no less to all those singular intellectuals who have honestly and truthfully carried it forward.

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